The day after our ice trek, we wearily drove on to Lake Matheson, supposedly one of the most-photographed lakes in New Zealand. Again though the weather was bad, so although we were able to walk around the lake and get some pretty nice views from Reflection Island, the mountains in the distance were covered by clouds, which somewhat defeated the object as the whole point of Reflection Island is that you can see Mount Cook in the distance reflecting in the lake.

We also went to view the Fox Glacier, Franz Josef's neighbour, which you can also trek onto and is similar in look to Franz Josef. The trek takes you to within about a kilometre of the glacier's face, so you can get right up close without actually trekking onto it. You can also skydive over the area.

The next day we drove further south to the Fiordlands, which we were looking forward to as the weather here has been dreary and cold, and the towns are small and full of backpackers (we usually like to avoid them!) who arrive on the f*ck-truck. The f*ck-truck is what people call the buses that drive backpackers around New Zealand, but so far the people we've come in contact with from the buses are eighteen year olds with daddy's credit card....not our cup of tea!

Also, we had a shocker at 5am in the morning when a World War 2 air-siren started going off in the small town by the Fox Glacier. Being on a massive fault line between the Australian and Pacific tectonic plates and surrounded by glaciers (plus half asleep), we were debating whether it was an earthquake, nuclear attack or an avalanche, and we weren't the only ones as everyone in the campsite was up walking around. After a while though nothing happened so we went back to sleep, only to find in the morning it was the town's fire alarm, as their firemen are voluntary. A bit disappointing really as we wanted some excitement, although we did experience our first earthquake up in the North Island, when during the night the earth moved (this is not a one-liner) and the walls and fittings shook. Apparently they have these all the time though, and if they don't it's bad as it means a big quake may be brewing. Still, another thing to tick of the 'to do' list......"experience earthquake - done"!

Next stop, Fiordlands.